Designing a Multi-Model Ecology for Dutch drinking water utilities

Abstract

The Dutch drinking water utilities are legally responsible for supplying drinking water to their assigned customer base. Continuing to supply drinking water for the long term is coming under pressure from challenges on the supply side, related to water quality and quantity on the one hand and developments due to increasing demand for drinking water on the other. Both developments are expected to be negatively influenced by the effects of climate change.
The Dutch drinking water companies face three major challenges regarding strategic investment decisions. First, the current sourcing and production capacity must be expanded to meet future drinking water demand. Second, there is a great demand for End-of-Life replacement of pipes in the drinking water infrastructure. Third, an investment challenge of a lesser financial magnitude but with an expected great impact on business operations is related to gaining operational control over the drinking water distribution network by integrating state-of-the-art sensor technology.

The outcomes of the internal decision-making processes of the drinking water utilities regarding these three strategic challenges will affect the stakeholders of the drinking water utilities. In addition, it offers possibilities for alignment with the goals of the other stakeholders. The main problem that this research seeks to address is a lack of engagement with drinking water utilities' stakeholders in the decision-making processes. A way to engage with stakeholders is by using Participatory Modelling, a technique that is not commonly applied by drinking water utilities.

These possibilities to engage stakeholders in the decision-making process are further backed by the development of new resources that have become available in recent years. These resources are new modelling techniques that have been applied in the field of drinking water research, in recent years. And, a novel perspective on multi-modelling e.g. the Multi-Model Ecology (MME) with Multi-Model Interface (MMI). In the current practice of research for Water Resource Management and other research for drinking water utilities, an MME and MMI (MME+I) have not yet materialised. This study aims to determine if an MME+I can benefit research for drinking water utilities and facilitate Participatory Modelling.

The Participatory Systems Design methodology (PSD methodology) is applied to generate a design for the conceptual model of the MME+I and the logical architecture for the MMI. A Proof of Concept (PoC) use case of model-coupling was applied. Here, an ABM model for Water Demand generates water demand patterns for an EPANET hydraulic model. This is a novel approach in hydraulic modelling for Dutch drinking water utility Oasen, since it introduces agents' behaviour from the ABM model to the modelling of hydraulic networks. It demonstrated that the outcomes of an ABM model affect the performance of the EPANET hydraulic model. In addition, It provided insight into how changes in water demand from scenario studies can affect strategic investment decisions for drinking water utilities.